Guilt is what separates humans from animals.

Keeping kids safe is sometimes a delusion. The world is a perilous place. Sometimes the kitchen is a perilous place.

The Statue of Liberty is meant to be shorthand for a country so unlike its parts that a trip from California to Indiana should require a passport.

The future is built on brains, not prom court, as most people can tell you after attending their high school reunion. But you'd never know it by talking to kids or listening to the messages they get from the culture and even from their schools.

Writing for UrbanMoms has awarded me a multitude of amazing opportunities. I have traveled to new places; alone and with my family. I have discovered new products, new books, new trends and new restaurants, and been able to share them with my readers. I've met other wonderful writers and many incredible celebrities.

While liberals had embraced Obama as someone who had left-wing progressive ideas, the truth is that by personality he's a very incremental guy.

If I get the forty additional years statisticians say are likely coming to me, I could fit in at least one, maybe two new lifetimes. Sad that only one of those lifetimes can include being the mother of young children.